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Tour of the Magazine Rack
Tour of the Magazine Rack
Jim Meadows
Published by Swampy Meadows
10-19-2009
Tour of the Magazine Rack

BEVERLY HILLS (MI) -- Time once again to take advantage of Borders Bookstore’s largesse and provide Flyer Fans with a free peek at what the College Basketball Yearbooks (CBYs) have to say about UD. Normally right about now I would be lamenting the dwindling number of publications to review, but not this time. When I first started doing this annual column on CBYs there were 6 or 7 of ‘em and they never had much to say about Dayton, so the article basically wrote itself; now every one of ‘em has the Flyers in their Top 25 and I have writer’s cramp from trying to jot it all down. Which is a good thing! Let’s get rockin’.

Lindy’s

A-10 Prediction: UD/X/Rich/LaS/UMass/TU/Duq/SBU/URI/SJU/Char/SLU/GW/FU

A-10 in the NCAA: UD and X

UD Prediction: #17 with the NCAA automatic bid

Other Teams of Interest: #4 Villanova; #13 Georgia Tech; #18 WVU; #34 Creighton; #38 X

Other Stuff: The A-10 is the #8 ranked conference, behind the Mountain West and ahead of Conference USA and Missouri Valley.

Chris Wright is ranked the #23 PF: “Spectacular dunker leads best Dayton team in recent memory.”

Georgia Tech is ranked as having the #5 frontcourt.

CW is 1st team All A-10; MJ is 2nd Team All A-10.

Returning A-10 Leaders: CW is #6 in scoring and #3 in rebounding; LW #3 in assists.

Good News: “11 of 12 top scorers are back from 27 win team that reached the NCAA Tournament 2nd round.”

Bad News: “Team has never won an outright Atlantic 10 regular season title and only 1 conference tournament title.”

Our Call: “Go ahead and order the championship merchandise. There’s just too much here.”

Quote/Unquote: “The Flyers led by YouTube dunking sensation Chris Wright finally have the depth and athleticism for Gregory -- a Tom Izzo disciple -- to implement the Michigan State system. It’s a system that demands intensity on defense and the backboards. If you’re not on board, find a new school.”

“Wright likely will be A-10 Player of the Year, Gregory will be in line for a more high profile job and the Flyers will win the A-10.”

Thus Sayeth BG: “One common thread is obvious. The person everyone feeds off of is Chris Wright. For him to be at his best, he needs to rebound and run the court. He needs to make aggressive plays around the basket.”

Atlantic 10 Honors:

POY: Chris Wright
Newcomer: Jordan Crawford, X
Top Shooter: Andrew Nicholson, SBU
Top Rebounder: Lavoy Allen, Temple
Top Defender: Garrett Williamson, SJU
Top Playmaker: DiJuan Harris, Charlotte
Most Versatile: Rodney Green, LaSalle
Top NBA Prospect: Chris Wright
Most Entertaining: Ricky Harris, UMass

Recruits: Top 100 Rising Seniors: Juwan Staten is #44

Top 100 Rising Juniors: #39 Jeremiah Davis of Muncie, IN; #84 Tommy McCune of Saginaw, MI; #97 Jakarr Sampson of Akron SVSM

Swampy Sez: Lindy’s used to be infamous for picking guys (particularly from Xavier) who had never played a minute of D-1 ball for Pre-Season All-League honors (see: Odia, Churchill and Coly, Boubacar). Nice to see they have gotten out of that habit.

Athlon

A-10 Prediction:UD/X/Duq/Rich/LaS/UMass/TU/UMass/Char/SBU/SJU/SLU/GW/FU

A-10 in the NCAA: UD “2 and out” and X “1 and done”

UD Prediction: #25 with the NCAA automatic bid

Other Teams of Interest: #7 Villanova; #13 Georgia Tech; #10 WVU

Other Stuff: “10 Coaches on the Hot Seat” list includes Paul Hewitt at GT, Jerry Wainwright at DePaul (will the Blue Demons come after BG again?) and Dereck Whittenburg at Fordham. Conversely, Flyer great Anthony Grant is one of the “Top 5 New Hires” and WSU’s Brad Brownell is one of “10 Under the Radar Coaches.”

Chris Wright is ranked the #3 “Slasher” and is an Honorable Mention All America.

Useless List: “12 Key Transfers for 2010-2011” Josh Parker from Drake to Dayton is included, but why list these guys now – they are all ineligible until next fall!

Article to Avoid: “The Cult of Calipari.” Yuck.

Article to Read: “Should I Stay/Should I Go.” Excerpt:

“In short, timing is everything when deciding to stay – or to go. One coach who seems to have perfected the art is Oliver Purnell. He’s changed levels three times, doing it the right way each time and enjoying success at his new stop every time. He went from Radford to Old Dominion to Dayton to Clemson.”

OP: “I really value turning programs around and making them solid and doing it the right way. Once that’s done, in some cases it’s an okay time for me to look for that next challenge.”

More OP: “There’s so much pressure among fans and alumni and the onslaught of the new media. It all combines to put more pressure on a coach to win and win now. The longer you stay somewhere, the more enemies you can make. People are judging you on a daily basis.”

Quote/Unquote: “Dayton fans haven’t been this excited since the mid-1980s and it is easy to see why.”

“The bench will rank among the deepest in the country.”

“With that many bodies and their trademark stingy defense the Flyers simply wear down many of the teams on their schedule. The key to improving is finding more offense and getting better at foul shooting.”

Thus Sayeth BG: “We are facing a different situation. Last year we had a collective chip on our shoulder. We are expected to take the next step now. The players have got to be so driven.”

Recruits: Top 100 Class of 2010: #82 Juwan Staten (#82 ???)

Top 75 Class of 2011: #53 Jakarr Sampson, Akron SVSM, #57 Jeremiah Davis, Muncie, IN

Swampy Sez: Athlon also has a “Fantasy Basketball” draft with 125 players in it – 50 guards, 50 forwards and 25 centers. They selected CW as an Honorable Mention All America and yet he isn’t even listed in the draft? And Juwan Staten is the #82 prospect in the class of 2010? What’s up with that?

The Sporting News

A-10 Prediction:UD/X/Rich/TU/Duq/Char/LaS/URI/UMass/SJU/SLU/SBU/GW/FU

A-10 in the NCAA: UD #6 seed and X #8 seed

UD Prediction: #23, behind ND and ahead of U of M

Other Teams of Interest: #9 Villanova; #5 WVU (didn’t we beat these guys?), #30 X. No Georgia Tech in the top 25, their main obstacles being that “PG play is iffy and the team is young.”

Top 25 Breakdown: “If anyone on this team could shoot, the Flyers might be able to shoot up in these rankings. Dayton didn’t have a single player who made even 50 3 pointers and/or shot 38% from long range last season. Of course, the Flyers made up for it with stellar defense and the fact that they are not much fun to play against. To become truly great, though, they’ll have to score baskets somehow.”

Other Stuff:

UD Power Rankings (out of 5)

Offense: 3
Defense: 5
Rebounding: 4
Playmaking: 3
Coaching: 3

Atlantic 10 Honors: CW is 1st Team All Atlantic 10

Best Penetrator: Kevin Anderson, Richmond
Best Passer: DiJuan Harris, Charlotte
Best Shooter: Opie, X
Best Shotblocker: Andrew Nicholson, SBU
Best Athlete: Chris Wright
Best Under Pressure: Ryan Brooks, Temple
Best Leader: London Warren
Best Rebounder: Lavoy Allen, Temple
Top NBA Prospect: Chris Wright
Top Freshman: Aaric Murray, LaSalle
Best Transfer: Jordan Crawford, X
Best Interview: Ryan Brooks, Temple
Best Coach: Fran Dunphy, Temple
Best Recruiter: Ron Everhart, Duquesne
Most Likely to Draw a T: Karl Hobbs, GW
Coach on Hot Seat: Dereck Whittenburg, Fordham
Best Home Court Advantage: Dayton

Impact Newcomer: Josh Benson

“This homegrown talent twice named an All-Ohio honoree, tore his labrum last pre-season and redshirted. He used the extra year to add 10 pounds and gain strength and will be a tough matchup for interior defenders because of his ability to shoot the mid-range jumper and handle the ball.”

Thus Sayeth BG: “We’re going to have guys thinking about what they need to do to get better now that they have tasted a little bit and it’s pretty good. I think they want more.”

Recruits: Top 150 Seniors: #44 Juwan Staten, #116 Brandon Spearman

Top 150 Juniors: #40 Jeremiah Davis, Muncie, IN; #87 Tommy McCune, Saginaw, MI; #101 James Siakam, Chicago, IL; #105 Trey Burke, Columbus Northland

Oak Hill is #3 in the Top 25 High School rankings; Columbus Northland is #6

“5’11” Juwan Staten, has already committed to Dayton where he could make a major impact on the Atlantic 10.”

Swampy Sez: Of all 3 of these College Basketball Yearbooks, TSN gives UD the most love. I just wish that Street and Smith’s was still around to see this year’s team.

Blue Ribbon: #19

Not available on the newsstands but you can see their pre-season picks here:

http://www.atlantic10.com/sports/m-b...092009aaa.html

The Bottom Line on the CBYs: Flyer Fans have waited forever for this to occur: every College Basketball Yearbook picking UD for their pre-season Top 25. How smart is BG: notice that he gave a different quote to each of the 3 CBYs?

But of course, in the Internet age there is much more to consider than just the printed page. Here is what some of the websites are saying about the Dayton Flyers for the upcoming campaign.

CollegeHoopsNet: #19

http://www.collegehoopsnet.com/updat...ansas-1-167148

CBS Sportsline: #17

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebask...story/12316643

Yahoo Sports Non-Big 6 Power Rankings: #2

http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/basketb...yhoo&type=lgns

Dickie V on ESPN.com: #27

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/dickv...ory?id=4361336

Yardbarker: #55

Unanimous winner of the “What Are These Guys Smokin’ Award” goes to Yardbarker.com. #55? Really?

http://www.yardbarker.com/College_Ba...Dayton/1333377

Bleacher Report: #19

I’m sorry, but signing the 2009 Toxic Recruit of the Year Lance Stephenson does not magically make UC the #18 team in the country:

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2...-top-25/page/2

HoopScoop: NR?

Clark Francis should stick to handicapping 6th graders, as he is clearly out of his element picking a college hoops Top 25. No way Binghamton is #27 before, during or after the scandal broke out in the middle of nowhere in upstate New York:

http://www.hoopscooponline.com/membe...2009-2010.html

FoxSports.com: #27

Jeff Goodman actually only ranks the top 25 (with X at # 24), but UD is listed 2nd in the “20 more to watch” addendum, kinda like the “also receiving votes” list at the bottom of the AP and USA Today polls. Having worked at CNN for 10 years, I have never liked Fox and now I know why:

http://msn.foxsports.com/cbk/story/1...25-for-2009-10

CNN-SI: #17

CNN-SI has UD rated the highest of any website, but of course they only did profiles of the top 15. Schmucks.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/200...son/index.html

The Sports Flow: #18

http://thesportsflow.blogspot.com/20...asketball.html

CollegeHoopsVideo.com: #17

Never heard of ‘em (but then again, they’ve never heard of me, either) but you gotta like they way they think:

http://www.collegehoopsvideo.com/200...eptember-2009/

Walter Football: #19

See what happens when you do a Google search for ‘2010 college basketball Top 25 rankings?’ You get some football site’s prediction of the college basketball top 25 (and it was listed 1st in the search results!), where Xavier and new coach “Jeff” Mack are picked #10. Those two misprints pretty much told me all I needed to know about Walter Football’s credibility right there:

http://walterfootball.com/collegebasketballtop25.php

D-1 Men’s Basketball Expenses: #81

This is one poll where I’m okay with UD not being in the Field of 65:

http://www.bbstate.com/info/schools-hoopsbudget

ESPN/Sagarin All-Time College Basketball Rankings: #48

http://assets.espn.go.com/photo/2009/1004/cbe1.pdf

Let’s get the season started already!

That’s it “From the Swamp.”
You can email me at: swampy@udpride.com
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  #1  
By Swampy Meadows on 10-19-2009, 12:12 PM
TSN the magazine has different content than their CBY. You can find it here:

http://today.sportingnews.com/sporti...folio=CGI#pg44
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  #2  
By Avid Flyer on 10-19-2009, 08:34 PM
Oh that magazine rack...er sorry was in the wrong section.
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  #3  
By The Chef on 10-21-2009, 12:36 PM
Re: Yardbarker, it's important to note that they were trying to rank the teams based on intrigue. The Most Interesting Team. (IOW, pretty much a worthless ranking.) Consider if you will the fact that the New Jersey Institute of Technology (i.e., the one that one just one game all of last season and none the year before) is ranked 64th on that list, not in the 300's.

Frankly, I think interest of drama an intrigue, UD should rank pretty low on the list. I expect us to be what most people think we are. The team has one bonafide star and a bunch of solid super-athletic players that play their role to a tee. Not much of a saga there, but it tends to work. Besides, just going and winning every game can get boring to the general masses. So, I would like to break the unanimity on the "What are these guys smokin'?" award. They seem pretty sane to me.
Last edited by The Chef; 10-21-2009 at 12:39 PM..
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